Author: Sharon

Tweets for the tweetless Part Two

Starting with Theo’s first whisper to all words on Wednesday, March 31, 2010.

from the BaenBooks twitter feed: “Yeah…” she whispered, and raised a hand to the yellow toggle. “Tower, this is Theo Waitley, sitting second on Torvin…Out of Solcintra.”

from the BaenBooks twitter feed: “My Scout,” Theo said carefully, “Win Ton. He’s on his way to Liad, to be married.”

from the BaenBooks twitter feed: These guys were playing bloodball, the usually happy crew of the Club scattered. “Take him, Theo!” The encouragement was Bova at full voice.

from the BaenBooks twitter feed: Shaking her head to settle her hair as best as could be done, Theo spread the chain between her two hands, and put it over her head.

from the BaenBooks twitter feed: “Second,” Theo said to yos’Senchul, “is there a reason the ship that just showed up without Jump glare isn’t tagged with name or ID number?”



Tweets for the Tweetless

Some of you may know — and some others of you may not know — that Theo is a Guest Tweeter at Baen Books this week.  Theo’s entries are mirrored on Steve’s Facebook account, but he hesitates to post them to his LJ for fear of setting up a loop, as Facebook also mirrors his LJ account.

So!  For those of you who neither tweet nor FB, the following are Theo’s tweets thus far, starting with Tweet The First.  I’ll append the new ones as I can, but Theo’s going off at a rate of five a day, so there will be lag…

from the BaenBooks twitter feed: Theo Waitley says: Snickiots! Anyone smart enough to be landing at the academy ought to know not to jostle the pilot!

from the Baenbooks twitter feed: Theo Waitley laughed, engulfed by blue sky and billowing clouds. They hadn’t outlawed happy at the Academy, and flying was a happy thing.

from the Baenbooks twitter feed: Theo felt her face warm, but she’d earned the sarcasm. After all, it wasn’t very advertent to be discovered doing needlework in math class.

from the BaenBooks twitter feed: Theo’s Father had pointed out, more than once, that the more noise you made, the more likely it was that you were using too much force.

From the Baenbooks twitter feed: Ahem, student. This object has traveled light years to reach us. It ought go to the person it was meant for. Erkes, Suite 302. Theo Waitley.

From the Baenbooks twitter feed: Academy note – Saltation: That which proceeds by leaps rather than by smooth and orderly progression. See details: http://alturl.com/zhjf

From the BaenBooks twitter feed: It was blood, but not much of it, and the game had still been going strong when Theo left.  “Not dripping.  I’ll clean it,” she promised Asu.

From the BaenBooks twitter feed: After she’d been pushed into Advanced Power, she’d hear mock-cloned “Not good, Theo,” half-whispered or louder as she walked the airfield. . .

From the BaenBooks twitter feed: “Key,” Theo said around a growing coldness in her stomach, adding “You can’t find current flight time because my father is a retired pilot.”

From the BaenBooks twitter feed: “I don’t have an attitude problem,” Theo told him, but Chelly only laughed again.

Things that make no sense

So, a co-worker today asked me how my weekend had been.  I confessed that while I had made progress, I hadn’t gotten as much writing done as I had hoped to, which is sort of always the case, really.

She stared at me.  “Are you writing another book?”

Well, yeah; that’s what I do.

“When’s it due?”

August.

“Do you feel under pressure?”

Not so much pressure as I would just like to get the damn’ draft done so I can see what I have and what I don’t have.  Right now, it’s all sorta roiling around in my head and I can’t really see what’s missing.

“How do you do that?  Write, I mean.  Do you just make it up?”

Well, mostly.  I mean, the characters have history, and you have to respect that, plus it’s a complex book because it’s the elbow book that joins two parallel tracks of story.  Some of the setting’s been used in a previous book, so  I need remember where things are, and I have an idea of where it’s all going to wind up, but most of the time I’m wrong about that, so I expect that’s the case this time, too. . .

“But I mean, how do you do it?”

Damned if I know.  How do you not do it?

She laughed, and I did and we got on with the day.

But that got me thinking about all those things that other people seem to master so easily, which make no sense whatsoever to me.

Minesweeper, for instance.

Sudoku, for another.

Any arithmetical function higher than simple bookkeeping.

How to figure out how much will fit in what space.  And how.

There are more, but you get the idea.

It occurs to me that everybody must have these mental twitches; these easy, everday things that make no sense.

What’s yours?

Traveling the World

Asyouknowbob, Steve and I will be Writer Guests of Honor at Oasis 23 in Orlando, from May 28 to 30, which we’re really looking forward to, and if you’re in the area, or close to in the area, you should come on by.  We get south so seldom, and we want to meet everybody!

In an excess of optimism, we scheduled several days in town after the convention in order to do things like booksignings and/or library talks, as is our pleasant habit, and also to play the tourist a little.

Alas, the store that seemed most likely to host a book-signing — Urban Think — is going out of business at the end of this month (*mourns the loss of yet another independent bookstore*).  The Orlando area seems to be well-served by used bookstores, but if there’s a new bookstore inside the city limits, I don’t find them.

So — appeal Number One for on-the-ground assistance.  Anybody local have a favorite bookstore we could contact in hopes of setting up a signing?

Appeal Number One, part A:  Anybody have contact with a local public library?  We like to talk at libraries.

Appeal Number Two:  There is so dern much to do in Orlando that I can’t figure out a way to filter it.  I very much doubt that Magic Mouse Land is my cup of tea, but Epcot Center seems like it would be interesting.  People who have been there — and you are legion! — what’s to do in Orlando for two middle-aged fuddy-duddies who will be in from Maine and doubtless wilting with the heat?  We don’t have much money, but it would be a shame to spend what’s likely to be my one and only visit to Florida in a hotel room.

In which Rolanni is freed from the tyranny of the viewfinder

…and, boy, is that a hard habit to break.

Also?  Trying to “drive” the picture in the screen is going to take some practice.

Therefore, I did a little practicing, with what results you may see for yourselves:

Mozart
Mozart's interested
Scrabble
Scrabble mugs for the camera
Hexapuma the Curious
Hex wants to know what all the excitement's about